Cof­fee invi­ta­tion 2025

The aro­ma of fresh­ly ground cof­fee fills our nos­trils and we hap­pi­ly start our con­ver­sa­tion in the year 2025 — with three seem­ing­ly sim­ple ques­tions. As is so often the case, a live­ly exchange devel­ops with a few aha moments. We would like to share three select­ed thoughts as an impulse for fur­ther cof­fee con­ver­sa­tions in a live­ly 2025.

What pos­i­tive­ly sur­prised us in 2024?

We have lived on Paradiesstrasse for many years. This sum­mer, we were able to real­ly dis­cov­er the dor­mant, human qual­i­ties of our par­adise. It has always been a friend­ly next door liv­ing and we could rely on “neigh­bour­hood watch.” A new­ly organ­ised sum­mer event in var­i­ous gar­dens, a sim­ple What­sApp group, a month­ly vol­un­tary meet­ing in the restau­rant at the begin­ning of the street — and in no time at all, a neigh­bour­hood atmos­phere has devel­oped that is char­ac­terised by cohe­sion, the joy of encoun­ters and a new under­stand­ing of com­mu­ni­ty. ‘Neigh­bour­hood care’ is what we can enjoy today with just a few impuls­es and almost no effort. We find the short con­ver­sa­tions on the way home sooth­ing and invig­o­rat­ing.

What did we keep shak­ing our heads about?

Prob­a­bly at the top of our “incom­pre­hen­sion hit list” is the unspeak­able home office debate, com­bined with the per­sis­tent des­per­ate strug­gle for an anti­quat­ed under­stand­ing of lead­er­ship. We seri­ous­ly ask our­selves:

• What com­pa­ny can still afford a polar­is­ing ‘black and white’ stance on these issues today?
• How can you com­plain about the short­age of skilled labour and at the same time speak out one-sided in favour of work­ing con­di­tions that often put off young top per­form­ers in par­tic­u­lar?
• How long can we stub­born­ly ignore the well-func­tion­ing and tried-and-test­ed solu­tions which com­bine both approach­es?
• How long will the ‘one-(wo)man and hero shows’ remain at the top or how many more dra­mas will it take before not exact­ly the same lead­er­ship pat­tern is rein­stalled?
• When will estab­lished com­pa­nies in par­tic­u­lar man­age to coura­geous­ly deal with the new forms of col­lab­o­ra­tion and make the nec­es­sary sys­temic adjust­ments?

What impressed and inspired us?

When you are allowed to ful­fil a life­long dream and gaze in amaze­ment into the maw of Moth­er Earth on Van­u­atu, then grat­i­tude, humil­i­ty and fas­ci­na­tion are a prover­bial­ly explo­sive inspi­ra­tion. The encounter with the vol­ca­nol­o­gist, who sees this place as his dai­ly place of work and thus as his rou­tine, made an addi­tion­al impres­sion on us.

The nat­ur­al friend­li­ness of the Melane­sians, the cheer­ful, approach­able way of inter­act­ing — even if the same ques­tions are answered anew every day — have set an exam­ple for us. We are con­vinced that this is only pos­si­ble if you are gen­uine­ly inter­est­ed in the oth­er per­son and if you can and want to see the encounter as an exchange and mutu­al enrich­ment. Ser­vice and friend­li­ness are there­fore no longer a task, but a nat­ur­al mat­ter of course that is cul­ti­vat­ed and devel­oped on a dai­ly basis.

We would be very inter­est­ed to hear what thoughts are going through your minds — but per­haps we will find out over a cof­fee togeth­er this year.

Let us strive to an inspir­ing time togeth­er — we look for­ward to it!!